Welcome to Tooting — the home of singing songwriter Sandi Thom. Tooting is very special to Sandi Thom because it is from her 'basement flat' in this unassuming south London location that she WEBCAST her AMAZING SONGS to THE WORLD.
Tooting has already given us the greatest new talent of the century — so let's see what else it has to offer.
This is Tooting's local record store — probably where Sandi Thom supports independent artists by picking up the latest obscure releases, like the new album from folk-pop troubadours Journey South, or 'Housework Songs Vol 2'.
Let's have a look and see what's on sale.
Literally wow — it's the Sandi Thom album, 'Smile… It Confuses People'. Do you see?!! Do you see that the modern world is so 'evil' and 'faceless' that nobody expects to be smiled at! Everyone is miserable in this terrible contemporary Hell!! It's not like in 'the olden days' when you could leave your windows open when you went out and all the locks were made of cardboard because there was no crime E! T! C!
Public health warning: people keep getting shot in Tooting. That is why they are not smiling.
What, we wonder, is the housing market like in Tooting?
Well, this place would be ideal if you suddenly came into a load of money and your reflex action was to move somewhere else.
Now, as we know, Sandi is very interested in the Internet. We bet she's a regular here.
This is Tooting's local internet cafe — 'Netstop'. From its unassuming exterior you might not guess it but there are up to 160,000 people inside this cafe every night. (Not just 16. Anybody who claims to have seen no more than 16 people in here at any one time is just jealous/resentful of the success Netstop is enjoying. Why can't people just support independents like Netstop and stop finding fault.)
Although, now we think about it, Sandi Thom may never have set foot in Netstop, because she wishes she lived in a time before the internet came along and ruined everything.
But — HANG ON! That wouldn't make sense either, because Sandi Thom has used the internet to promote her own music, and that would make her a total hypocrite. And THAT would just not make sense!
All this thinking is making us hungry. Let's buy some food!
Here's Tooting Sainsbury's. Let's have a look at what they're selling.
Well who'd have guessed it — a big business product masquerading as a 'homespun' 'cottage industry', selling itself on 'values' and 'morals' completely at odds with the fact that it's launched itself into a cutthroat, commercially-driven modern marketplace where it sits alongside everything else.
All this modern life is making us sick. We must leave Sainsbury's immediately.
ARGH! Cars! Parked! In a car park! This doesn't fit in with Sandi's vision of an ideal world where vehicles didn't exist and everyone died when they got ill and burned to death in their houses because ambulances and fire engines had yet to be invented, ie the good old days!
Clickety click…
It's the Tooting bingo hall! This is where MOANING OLD FOOLS go to complain about the fact that things aren't as good as they used to be.
They'd be far better off at…
…the Tooting Public Library. This is where you could go if you wanted to educate yourself about history. For example, you might want to find out whether 'the past' — let's say, the years 1977 and 1969 — was actually all fun and laughs, or whether those years were in fact THE SAME AS EVERY OTHER YEAR IN HISTORY in the sense that some good things happened but some bad things also happened.
Let's have a look at some art.
A touching mural: "Life's better together". Hang on — it's on the side of a McDonalds restaraunt. But that would make it no more than an example of twee and idealistic sloganeering, covering up something tasteless, corporate and insubstantial! How can this be?!?!
Well, our time in Sandi Thom's Tooting is almost up. Perhaps we should take home a souvenier of our time in Thom Country. Let's go to a newsagent to see if they have anything on offer.
Sentimental, gaudy novelty items.
That'll do nicely.
What a load of old rubbish.